I stopped at Browns Point Park this morning (10/16) at about 11:30 am and
was unable to locate the female Lapland Longspur. I searched even the upper
grassy areas and in between the logs at the pebble beach without success. It
may be still around, but there are too many dogs being walked in the park.
Best bird was a PACIFIC LOON cruising around the point.
I continued down to the overlook from which the BLACK-TAILED GULL has been
observed and joined several other birders there. Nobody there had seen it,
but somebody thought it had been seen earlier in the morning. There were
very few gulls on the logs, but a large number of them were feeding way out
at the mouth of the Puyallup River. I drove to the second overlook south,
were I was joined by Ruth Sullivan. Together we observed a PIGEON GUILLEMOT
and a MARBLED MURRELET out in Commencement Bay. I also stopped just before
Charlies Marina and had a good look at three LEAST SANDPIPERS. A short stop
at Dash Point Dock on the way home, yielded a COMMON LOON.
My final stop was at Treasure Island Park here in Twin Lakes. The rain had
stopped for a brief period and a large group of AMERICAN WIGEONS and also a
few CANADA GEESE were busy keeping the grass short and the walkways
"mined".. The wigeons are still easily spooked and took off and landed on
the lake. I was able to pick out a male EURASIAN WIGEON the last couple of
days. The geese continued feeding and much to my surprise, had two immature
GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GEESE visiting with the local honkers. Both lacked
the white front and had a rather dirty face and no "speckle bellies". They
reminded me of last winters "Odd Couple" : a Cackling Goose paired with an
immature White-Front which spent several weeks here in Twin Lakes. I also
had a single CACKLING GOOSE for two days on the same lawn last week.
Last not least, we have one male and two female CANVASBACKS on Lake Jeane.
They are very uncommon here and normally don't show up until later in the
winter.

Good Birding!

Hans Feddern
Twin Lakes/Federal Way, Wa.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman1.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20091016/a2d829f5/attachment.htm